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5.0 out of 5 stars
Christmas in Hamburg, Anyone?, September 19, 2009
This review is from: Telemann: Christmas Oratorio (Audio CD)
Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767) composed these three exuberant holiday cantatas in 1759, 1761 & 1762 as part of his official chores for the city and churches of Hamburg, where he served as musical czar for more than 40 years. Hamburg, foremost of all German cities in the Baroque, had the musicians, the poets, and the audience to support extravagant Christmas performances, both in public concert and as part of worship services, and Telemann made the most of his opportunities. These are grand cantatas for soloists, chorus and orchestra of winds, strings, and drums. Each of them could stand alone, but here they are assembled as a mammoth oratorio comparable to the similar assemblage of six small cantatas into a oratorio by JS Bach. The comparison to Bach would be interesting to hear; Telemann's "Christmas" is totally joyous and majestic, while Bach's has shades of tenderness and intimations of the later Passion.
The texts of Telemann's cantatas come chiefly from the standard Lutheran Christmas chorales that everyone in Hamburg would have known by heart and from the meditations of Telemann's favorite young Hamburgish poet, Karl Wilhelm Ramler. The 1757 cantata begins with the 'macaronic' (in Latin and German) chorale 'O Jesu Parvule', known to English church-goers as "Now sing we and rejoice". If you, dear reader, have church-going in your present or past, you'll have no doubt that this is Christmas music once you hear that melody. In fact, this music is so thoroughly Christmasy throughout that you may want to save it for December, as an alternative to the Bach oratorio and/or Handel's Messiah. It belongs in that exalted company. Christmas in America is, after all, a German holiday. "What?" I hear someone shouting. Well, it shouldn't be so surprising, when one of every six Americans has full or partial German ancestry, according to the US Census. And the German presence dates from before the Revolution. Most of the most popular traditional Christmas carols are German/Austrian in origin. The Tannenbaum -- Oh Christmas Tree! -- is Germanic. The cookies? The Stollen? The favorite Renaissance paintings of the manger? Think about it! Even Santa looks Deutsch to me.
This performance by the Kammerchor and Kammerorchester Michaelstein, conducted by Ludger Remy, is by far the best of several recordings available. The soloists are soprano Constanze Backes, alto Mechthild Georg, tenor Andreas Post, and the indispensable basso Klaus Mertens, who always sings most expressively for Remy. A composer in Telemann's era, like today, could expect his largest audiences for Christmas concerts, and therefore would be extremely particular about the quality of the performance. Telemann would have been happy with this CD.
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